Gujarat Elections: Five days ahead of the crucial first phase of Gujarat polls, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Saturday released its ‘Sankalp Patra’ or manifesto in Gandhinagar. Gujarat CM Bhupendra Patel, BJP national president JP Nadda and state party president CR Patil were present at the launch of the party’s manifesto. The Gujarat elections will be held in two phases on December 1 and December 5. The counting of votes will take place on December 8.
The ruling party in its manifesto has promised to create 20 lakh jobs for the youth, especially 1 lakh jobs for women in the state during its five-year term. Besides this, it promised to implement the Uniform Civil Code, anti-radicalisation cell and the Recovery of Damage to Public and Private Property Act.
Gujarat, which is the home state of PM Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, is currently a political battleground as the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) are also contesting elections in the state.
Speaking at the launch of the manifesto, BJP chief Nadda said Gujarat is the land of change makers and made a reference to PM Modi and his remarkable journey, starting with Gujarat.
“For the progress of Gujarat, we will make Gujarat’s economy equal to 1 trillion economy by making the state a foreign direct investment destination. We will create an anti-radicalization cell to identify and eliminate potential threats and sleeper cells of terrorist organizations and anti-India forces, the BJP chief said on Saturday.
Apart from these, some important promises in the manifesto are:
- Convert 20,000 government schools into schools of excellence with a budget of Rs 10,000 crore in the next 5 years.
- Ensure that every citizen in Gujarat has a pucca house and ensure 100% implementation of Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana.
- Start a family card scheme, which will enable every family to take advantage of all the welfare schemes run by the state government.
- Set up 4 Gujarat Institutes of Technology (GIT) on the lines of IITs as centers of excellence in the areas of green energy, semiconductors, fintech and aerospace.
- Rs 10,000 crore investment under the Gujarat Agriculture Infrastructure Fund to develop a holistic system of Khedut mandis, modern APMCs, sorting and grading units, cold chains, warehouses, primary processing centres, etc.
- Invest Rs 1,000 crore for the renovation, expansion and promotion of temples following the successful transformation models of Somnath, Ambaji and Pavagadh.
- Double the annual cap under Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (Ayushman Bharat) from Rs 5 lakh to Rs 10 lakh per family and ensure free medical treatment.
- Launch Mukhyamantri Free Nidan Yojana with a corpus of Rs 110 crore to provide free diagnostic services for EWS families in all government health institutions and empaneled laboratories.
- Launch the Gujarat Olympic Mission with the aim of hosting the Olympic Games in 2036 and create world-class sports infrastructure.
- Build a Birsa Munda Adi Jati Samridhi Corridor between Ambaji and Umergram to connect every tribal district headquarters with a 4-6 lane state highway, and a tribal corridor to connect Pal Dadhav and Statue of Unity to Shabri Dham Cultural circuit can be built.
- Ensure state-of-the-art health facilities in tribal areas by setting up 8 medical colleges and 10 nursing/para-medical colleges.
